Sword in the water. There is no better way to describe the longest budget paralysis in the United States that officially ends this Wednesday, November 12 after a vote in Congress ratified by Donald Trump in the evening. A record 43-day government shutdown was presented by Democrats as the first major challenge to the Republican president’s unstoppable authoritarian streak. They hope to gain, in exchange for a vote on the budget, an expansion of subsidies for Obamacare, health insurance for the lowest-income households.
But this weekend, just days after a series of election victories in New York and in several states that seemed capable of reviving the progressive camp after a bleak year, seven Democratic senators and one other independent threw in the towel. They agreed to vote with Senate Republicans so they got 60 of the 100 votes needed to finance the federal government. No real commitment to health insurance. About 650,000 federal employees will return to work after five weeks of technical unemployment and a wait that proved futile.
This agreement, which passed this Wednesday by 222 votes to 209 votes in the House of Representatives where Republicans have a majority, postpones the prospect of new budget paralysis until January 30. A handful of Democratic senators only got a ruling that layoffs of 4,000 federal employees be reversed in early October, and no other layoffs will take place between now and the next budget deadline. But funding from SNAP, a food assistance program that benefits more than 42 million Americans and has been suspended since November 1, is also being maintained through September 2026.
On the main topic causing the budget paralysis, the “Affordable Care Act”, nicknamed Obamacare, they only got the promise of a vote in the Senate in December, which is by no means binding on the Republican majority. Without extended subsidies, more than 20 million Americans would see the price of their health insurance more than double starting January 1. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that two million Americans will be forced to give up all insurance next year.
“These elected members of the Democratic Party are deeply concerned about who will ultimately be responsible for the government shutdown.estimated Don Kettl, former dean of the School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland. As air traffic congestion increases and concerns about food aid increase, they worry that people will be harmed and that they will ultimately be the ones to blame.”
In short, a win for Donald Trump. Because he, who sees the Democratic Party’s success in the November 4 election as a consequence of the government shutdown, would rather continue to cause chaos than engage in discussion with his opponents. His administration then chose to illegally block SNAP aid payments, encouraging many citizens to wait in line at food distributions, and reducing the number of flights to increase air traffic chaos, while many inspectors who were unpaid due to budget paralysis no longer showed up at airports. It’s this intransigence, ten days before the hugely popular Thanksgiving, that will do more good for Democratic unity.
Because the defection of several elected representatives from the opposition (six deputies also voted for an end to the closing of the DPR on Wednesday evening) triggered a new existential crisis within the Party. These elected officials are accused on all sides of undermining a positive dynamic for American progressives. Democrats hope to use last week’s election results, which were largely seen as a rejection of the policies of Donald Trump whose popularity is declining, to put pressure on Senate Republicans. California Governor Gavin Newsom talks about X a “capitulation”.
One figure, in particular, focused the criticism: Senate party leader Chuck Schumer. If he votes against ending the government shutdown, he will be accused of failing to unite his forces. Last spring, the Democratic Party leader, elected from a New York constituency, was accused of not putting up enough resistance to Donald Trump by refusing to initiate the first budget paralysis. That this fall should allow him to prove his critics wrong. Failure is bitter.
“Politically, Democrats need to refocus their attention on Republicans, as angry as they are over the betrayal of eight senators.said Mark Longabaugh, a highly progressive Bernie Sanders campaign strategist in the 2016 Democratic primary. We must not forget the central issue of health and the question of who is in charge, namely the Republican Party.
Because despite concerns from the majority – the Republican leader in the House, Mike Johnson, welcomed the end of a “long national nightmare” –, this could backfire on the simplest health insurance price increase since January. “They keep talking about health reform to end Obamacare, but they haven’t proposed any plan to replace it”underlines Don Kettl. “We want a health system where money is paid directly to people and not to insurance companies”Donald Trump simply made the announcement Monday from the Oval Office without further details.
“There are only two possible outcomes of this fightaccording to Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic Party’s chief representative who spoke ahead of Wednesday night’s vote. Either Republicans finally decide to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits this year, or the American people will throw Republicans out of office next year.” Unable to take advantage of this painful shutdown, and realizing that the December polls will do nothing, Democrats want to make health insurance their hobby horse for the midterm elections, which will occur this year, in which most of the two houses of Congress will be renewed. “They will now do everything to confront the Republicans with their contradictions”Don Kettl anticipated.
Several elected officials have started this Wednesday by relaunching another political soap opera that may be Donald Trump’s Achilles’ heel: the Epstein affair. Therefore, lawmakers have made public a series of emails from Jeffrey Epstein, who is accused of leading a large, small-scale prostitution ring, including one email from 2019 that appears to implicate the American president in ensuring that he ‘know about women’.
The White House immediately reacted by condemning a “trickery”. “Democrats are ready to do whatever it takes to divert attention from poorly managed budget paralysis”defended Donald Trump himself on Truth Social even though the president has long been close to Jeffrey Epstein. This is because the case has embarrassed the billionaire since this summer: some of his supporters are angry that he has since this summer refused to reveal documents held by the government, which he had promised to do during his campaign.
This was possible paradoxically thanks to the end of the government shutdown: the return of representation to Congress made possible the swearing-in of Adelita Grijalva. And the Democrat-elect from Arizona quickly added the final required signatures to a parliamentary petition that will result in a vote next week to declassify the notorious documents. Air traffic resumed but turbulence began to occur.
